The novel monomers are cyclic polyoxalkylene polyethers joined by spiro linkages to one or more oxetane or 1,3-dioxane rings.
Preparation of the cyclic tetramer of ethylene oxide, ##STR4## is described in British Pat. No. 785,229. Other cyclic polyethers, capable of complexing cations, have been described by Pederson in J. Am. Chem. Soc. 89:7017 (1967) and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,687,978. Archer, et al. in Chem. & Ind. 1271 (1969) describe the preparation of compounds of the formulas
Farthing, in Chapter 5 of "High Polymers" Vol. XIII, (Interscience, 1963), describes linear polymers of the repeating units ##STR5##
Compounds with polyoxyalkylene cyclomer functional groups have been shown to form complexes with certain alkali and alkaline earth metal cations in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,562,295 and 3,686,225.